Mariners Can’T Resist Saying ‘I Do’

The newest Seattle Mariner has, so far this calendar year, been hauled into court on matters of paternity and bigamy.

And they said Al Martin wasn’t a triple crown threat.

Feel free to apply the “m-y” or “t-y” kinkiness of your choice to complete that thought. Or not. If Al stings righthanded pitching often enough to help keep the Mariners a few games to the good atop the American League West, little energy will be devoted to dwelling on his peccadillos - though we may forever lament that his concurrent I-dos at multiple altars would have made him the perfect poster boy for a mothballed ad slogan.

The Seattle Mariners. You gotta love these guys.

In acquiring Martin from the San Diego Padres a 3-minute egg before Monday’s trading deadline, the M’s fulfilled their biggest need: avoiding the appearance that they weren’t doing anything.

When teams with 11-game leads are out there scavanging high-salary spare parts on the 31st of July, you understand that this has become a bit of a cartoon. The also-ran’s grand salary dump meets the contender’s youcan-never-have-enough talent grab in a front-office middle ground of justifying one another’s existence.

As we said, Al Martin could be just the swizzle stick the M’s need for their cocktail, though just how manager Lou Piniella figures on deploying six outfielders is anybody’s guess. By September, that won’t be creatine or some other muscle-building supplement on Raul Ibanez’s locker shelf, but a can of WD-40.

One thing we knew for sure: John Mabry wasn’t going to win Seattle a pennant, and Tom Davey didn’t figure in the club’s plans. And those were the warm bodies the M’s had to give up to get Martin, which means they gave up nothing at all. This wasn’t Woody Woodward gutting the farm system to get Mike Timlin and Heathcliff Slocumb, Mr. Flamma and Mr. Ble.

Now, there is the matter of $5 million Martin is guaranteed in salary next season. But, hey - what next season?

Still, not everyone recognized the acquisition of a good left-handed bat as being Seattle’s most vital need, but it’s been a mostly silent minority - perhaps not wishing to vocalize a fear lest it become a verity.

So allow me.

Is Kazuhiro Sasaki really the guy?

The bullpen, of course, has been one of the prominent warm-and-fuzzies of this Mariners season - the reclamation of Jose Mesa, the continued growth of Jose Paniagua, the nasty reliability of Arthur Rhodes and the emergence of Sasaki, whose world-class smile lights up Safeco Field after every save.

And he has a slew of them - 25. Fifteen to 20 more in the next two months is going to make it pretty hard not to give the 32-year-old Japanese import the rookie of the year award.

But even before Sasaki was greased by the Boston Red Sox on Monday night - he surrendered the tying RBI and a three-run homer when Piniella pressed his luck by calling on his closer in the eighth inning rather than the ninth - there were grounds for reserving judgment.

Hey, hold your fire. No one’s suggesting Bobby Ayala get refitted for a uniform, OK?

But through no particular fault of his own, the saves Sasaki has managed to amass have been, largely, soft ones - protecting two and three-run leads, often at home in a ballpark that a good deal less vulnerable than what Ayala and his fellow torchmasters had to contend with.

In fact, 20 of Sasaki’s 25 saves have come with more than a one-run lead. Indeed, in his streak of 15 successful save opportunities that was snapped on Monday night, only once did he have to protect a one-run cushion.

Again, not much he can do about that.

But when he has had to pitch in closer circumstances, Sasaki has been something less than commanding. Eight times he’s entered with a one-run lead, saving five of those and blowing three saves. And with the score tied, he has won one, lost three and left one with no decision.

That means 13 times he’s come in with the score tied or the M’s ahead by one, and almost half the time matters end badly for the fighting Safecos.

And those, frankly, are Ayalaesque numbers.

Just for reference, we checked Sasaki’s A.L. West colleagues and found a significantly better success rate. In Oakland, 11 of Jason Isringhausen’s 23 saves have been one-run affairs. In Anaheim, Troy Percival has converted 12 in 25 total saves. At Texas, John Wetteland - shopped around a bit at the trading deadline - has 26 saves, half of them coming in one-run situations.

They also have 20 blown saves among them - while Sasaki has just three.

But then, it’s tougher to blow a save if the opposition has to push across three or four runs in the ninth.

This little extra margin for error the Mariners have enjoyed has gone largely unnoticed in the celebration over Seattle’s surge to the top of the standings, and there’s no sense courting despair. And, obviously, the last thing general manager Pat Gillick or anyone else in the organization wanted to do at this point is monkey with the chemistry - which in the bullpen is always delicate, and to which Sasaki’s contributions cannot be underestimated.

His smile alone is enough to give a Mariners fan hope. Even in a one-run game.